"Yes, yes," said Nadia. "Brother, sister, mother—he has been all to me!"
"And defended you like a lion?"
"A lion indeed! " replied Nadia. "A lion, a hero!"
"My son, my son!" thought the old Siberian. "But you said, however, that he bore a terrible insult at that post-house in Ichim?"
"He did bear it," answered Nadia, looking down.
"He bore it!" murmured Marfa, shuddering.
"Mother, mother," cried Nadia, "do not blame him! He had a secret. A secret of which God alone is as yet the judge!"
"And," said Mar fa, raising her head and looking at Nadia as though she would read the depths of her heart, "in that hour of humiliation did you not despise this Nicholas Korpanoff?"
"I admired without understanding him," replied the girl. "I never felt him more worthy of respect."
The old woman was silent for a minute.
"Was he tall?" she asked.
"Very tall."
"And very handsome? Come, speak, my daughter."
"He was very handsome," replied Nadia, blushing.
"It was my son! I tell you it was my son!" exclaimed the old woman, embracing Nadia.
"Your son!" said Nadia amazed, "your son!"
"Come," said Marfa; "let us get to the bottom of this, my child. Your companion, your friend, your protector had a mother. Did he never speak to you of his mother?"
"Of his mother?" said Nadia. "He spoke to me of his mother as I spoke to him of my father—often, always. He adored her."
"Nadia, Nadia, you have just told me about my own son," said the old woman.
And she added impetuously, "Was he not going to see this mother, whom you say he loved, in Omsk?"
"No," answered Nadia, "no, he was not."
"Not!" cried Marfa. "You dare to tell me not!"
"I say so: but it remains to me to tell you that from motives which outweighed everything else, motives which I do not know, I understand that Nicholas Korpanoff had to traverse the country completely in secret. To him it
